Basic Math

I’m sitting in probably my favorite spot in the whole world. It’s my been-through-lots-of-hard-times-with-me white chaise, in my “coffice” [coffee office].  It’s my “sweet spot”.   From this oh-so-comfy perch, I've had a bird’s eye view all summer of my daughter Coco as she has been the  nanny for three little girls who live directly across the street.

I am not one of those “I’ll think about that tomorrow” Scarlett O’Hara types. I live in reality, probably too much. Too much thinking about today, and definitely too much thinking about tomorrow…and the next day and the month and the year after that. Especially since this time next year our Coco will drive away to some college. We don’t know which college yet, or how far away it will be, but I know this:  however close or far, for this Momma, it will be too far.

That’s why this summer has been so great for me. There she was, looking like the young Mother of these three little tow heads. I see her playing with them, taking their pictures, painting their nails, running them all over town, going to the pottery place, swimming or roller skating. They are crazy about her. And, she gets to come over here any time of the day and drop by for a quick visit with my pretend grandchildren.

Today is her last day with them. Senior year starts tomorrow. They were just here, and I said to them, “Ya’ll have  had a really fun summer, huh?” Three pig-tailed heads nod in unison.  “I’m really glad Coco got to be your nanny this summer. Ya know why?” I ask and the oldest one pipes up: “’Cause she gets $400.00 a week?”( HAHAHA. Well, besides THAT. ) I laughed and said, “No, it’s 'cause I get to watch Coco from my window.” They all tilted their heads and smiled and I smiled back… then Coco gave me “the look” and ushered them out the door as if to say:  enough of the sappy sentimentality, already!                          

Today probably marks the last day that Coco will be “living” across the street from me. I remember when she was seven I asked her if she would call me every day when she grew up, and she quickly replied, “Call you? I’ll just come over, 'cause I’m gonna live next door!” And I said…. “promise?”

That was ten very short years ago. They flew by in ways I never dreamed they could. The difference between a seven year old and a seventeen year old cannot just be ten years!! It’s impossible. And although I am basically retarded in basic math, I still come up with ten when I subtract 7 from 17.

So today I kick down my fears and draw on my Faith to face the next ten years. Ten years that will most likely bring a college graduation, a wedding and possibly a grandbaby.

Since it is impossible to freeze her at age seven, or even seventeen, I give a long nostalgic sigh and a big gulp, and have no choice but to say, Bring it on!

My First Rodeo

Have you seen those t-shirts that say”This ain’t my first rodeo”? They make me laugh out loud and smile and think, boy, is that ever the truth.  Reminds me of what I have told my girls, seems like a thousand times….”I was born at night, but not last night”.  Yes, I have been “around the block” maybe one too many times, but, even though I am considered a Senior citizen by the Williamson County Rec Center, there still are some things I haven’t experienced yet.

Last Saturday our daughter Caroline graduated from High School. That was my “first rodeo”, in that department. And although I definitely “came to the dance late”, and there’s probably tons of you out there that have already been to that “Rodeo”, I hadn’t. Not til last weekend, at least.

I’ve been preparing for this day since her first day of Kindergarten, which, incidentally was last week, or so it seems to this Momma.

Makes me wanna stand on a very tall and wide soapbox and shout to all the new Moms out there “BELIEVE EVERYTHING THEY’RE TELLING YOU ABOUT HOW FAST IT GOES, AND DON’T ROLL YOUR EYES EVERYTIME THEY SAY TO ENJOY EVERY MINUTE OF IT!  (that was me shouting).

If I had a dollar for every time some well-meaning Mother-of-a-graduate rodeo veteran told me that…let’s just say I’d be writing this from some island with my own personal cook and masseuse.

But now I’m one of them, and I struggle with telling young Mothers those very same words, or just keeping my mouth shut…and drool over their soft sweet babies or chubby chatty toddlers.

Most of the time, I restrain myself, knowing full well that they’ve already heard it a gazillion times, but sometimes I’m feeling verklempt enough to just go ahead and say it. I tell myself that somehow no one, or not enough Rodeo vets  have told them, and that they need to hear it from me, and when they see the  tell-tale glistening in my eyes that they’ll stop and think about it.

The truth is, I was so utterly aware of it, soaking up every hug and squeeze and smell, telling and re-telling all their cute little brilliant quips (even though I didn’t get to post them on Facebook or Instagram) trying to enjoy every minute, but knowing that is impossible… and it snuck up on me anyway. There’s just some things in life that cannot be simulated, or known what it’ll feel like until, this time, it’s you. It’s you with the lump in your throat, fighting back the tears, losing that battle and wondering if it would be really weird if you let out just one relieving sob. Okay, relax, I didn’t let out that sob. I held it together, sort of.

I had been feeling on the verge of tears for the last six weeks since she shone like a constellation as she presented her Senior thesis, defended  it, (with the coolness of a ph.d. candidate) in front of a panel of teachers, and presented her Senior 40 hour project, each receiving a perfect score. ..Something that has never been done in the history of the school. Her thesis was on abortion and she’s already been asked to speak at a conference workshop by someone who was there and heard her wax eloquent. WELL NO WONDER  I  was such a mess as she strode confidently down the aisle in that cap and gown, looking all grown up, even though she’s barely seventeen and I know she’s my baby. To me, we’re still at the beginning and she’s sitting at her little desk  learning her ABC’s and 123’s. But, that wasn’t last week, and yes, we are at the beginning…the beginning of learning to let go.

Next year I get to ride in this rodeo all over again. And although I’ll know a little more about how  to stay in the saddle, I imagine I’ll be just as big a cry-baby cowgirl as I was on Saturday.

Succulents

Succulents

Have you noticed the new trend with Succulents? I first noticed it when I was in California last Fall. They were everywhere. Well, you know, in all the cool shops, like 7 Blue Chairs, the vintage dream-come-true shop of my wonderful friend Chris (I-can-spin-ten-plates-in-the-air-all-at –once) Blue. She’s always the trendsetter, in fashion, in home décor, heck, in pretty much everything. She’s a one of a kind. And she’s my kinda girl.  Oh, did I mention that she has five cutey kiddos?

Chris is a succulent.

 Succulent? you ask. Maybe you’re thinking of something juicy and tasty, which is a good thought, but I’m talking about plants “with fleshy water-storing parts”. Can you tell that my Caroline showed me how to access the dictionary and thesaurus while typing? Wow. Now that is fun. I feel tech-savvy right now. Ok, it’s over. But it felt good for just a moment there.

Maybe you don’t know this little secret about me. This citified farmer’s daughter has a degree in Vocational Agriculture Education, with an emphasis on Horticulture…so I know my succulents.

They’re like cactus (are able to go a really long time without a drink of water) but they don’t have prickly parts. Just soft cool-looking leaves, full of life-giving water parts.

Cacti are super hardy and tenacious. Two excellent traits. For people with “black” thumbs, they’d  be a great choice. No fear of killing a cactus…. except by over-watering, of course They’re perfect in the desert. ( Infact  my all time favorite devotional is called “Streams in the Desert”. I have worn out two hard back copies. If you find yourself in a desert season of life, now would be a great time to pick up a copy.)

People are drawn to succulents. If ya happen to be people watching at a nursery… but who does that, but me?... just watch ‘em  and you’ll see people reaching down and giving a gentle almost affectionate little squeeze to those thick little leaves. They just beg to be touched. People are drawn to the life in them. They want to touch it. They want to own it. They want to know that in the hard, incomprehensible times they’ll have what it takes to make it through. They’ll have that reserve, like the succulent.

Cacti have the same ability to hold a reserve of water and survive in the “dry” times. But nobody’s reaching out and touching them. They don’t seem to represent life like their cousin the succulent. I think you know why. Cause they’re prickly . Hey, maybe they’re lonely too cause nobody wants to know them or touch them or emulate them.

Maybe you know someone(s) who is prickly. Maybe you’re prickly. I know I certainly can be prickly. Back in my hormonal days I was prickly quite often. But I’d give Mr. Ten Days fair warning. Watch out! Feelin Prickly today! Steer clear!

The genius is to not let prickly become your state of being. Which in this world of dishes and diapers and sleep deprivation, prickly can become the norm. Problems that take way too long to be solved, dwindling financial resources, raising teenagers, miscommunication with your “beloved”, etc. etc. etc. all add up to one prickly momma.

I guess the only way to change from a cactus to a succulent is to allow someone far enough into your heart and your life to begin the tricky and tedious  but loving task of removing the spikes from your very tender self. Maybe it’s a wise, trusted friend, or maybe it’s God Himself.

That, or a big dose of some really good hormone medicine

Where's the Tomatoes?

Ehhh, you’ve probably heard it before, perhaps from the pulpit. “If we truly reap what we sow, some of you out there better start praying for crop failure.”

Yeh, well certainly before August 1978, (yep, it’s been that long) I definitely sowed some seeds that I am glad never sprouted. But ever since that fateful day when I knelt by my bed and offered up my own rendition of “the sinner’s prayer”, “Lord, this is really hard for me…to turn my whole life, every bit of it over to you. But, I realize you probably couldn’t screw it up more than I have.” Have you ever heard such a great prayer of faith and trust!? I realize it wasn’t filled with faith or Trust, but God in His mercy and sense of humor, let me in anyway. (I won’t get into how I feel about that cause my eyes will be so filled with tears I won’t be able to see the keyboard.) He didn’t see me that day the way I was. He saw what he could do with a finally surrendered heart.  He had the big picture.

In the darkest moments of my life, which happened to be after I gave it all to Jesus…hmmm, I’m thinking that’s not the way it’s supposed to be. The sinner’s prayer is supposed to be my “get outa jail free” card. This earth and all its junk and  all its pain will now be a walk in the proverbial park. Oh, that’s right, that’s what I wanted to believe, and truth be known what a lot of people led me to believe. When right there in His How-to-live-in-a-fallen-world handbook it says, very clearly that we will suffer trials and persecutions.  In those darkest moments and in some tough places since, He has always, by His mercy, given me the big picture. And it’s made all the difference.

My crop of hopes and dreams are like when I plant those delicious Heirloom tomatoes and up comes Brussels sprouts or lima beans, or bokchoy...when my careful planting and pruning and watering yields some foreign food. Now, actually I happen to like Brussels sprouts and lima beans (no idea about bokchoy, but it sounds gross) but if that’s not what I was expecting….I don’t sit around googling Brussels sprout recipes. I sit around wondering what the heck went wrong, and, unfortunately there is usually some complaining involved.

Why did my crop fail? I prayed, and prayed hard, mind you. I did everything the manual said. Okay, maybe I didn’t follow it perfectly all the time, but man, I sure followed it more than well enough to get me some tomatoes! And some really nice sweet glossy red ones too!

And here’s the real sting of it all. This is not the first time I’ve had what seemed to be a crop failure. And each time, it stings a little more. Cause each time it waters my disappointment. “But I was so sure about this crop, I took even greater care this time. What’s going on here?”

Sure, I could find some recipes for my surprise crop, and it just might taste pretty good, but that’s not the point. I want what I planted. I wanted it last time …and the time before that, too! Frankly, I’m pretty sick of this little drill. This wasn’t what I was expecting. Ahhh,  those ever-present, persistent expectations… will I ever learn?

So up from my “garden” I look and ask Him to give me the big picture. Getting to see how God was arranging even the toughest of times into a beautiful field of redeemed circumstances, furrow after gently tilled furrow, gave this weary farmer renewed hope.

 Ohhhh, now I see. Oh, ok, I get it.  Oh, you’re making this totally delicious enormous pot of  soup that calls for all sorts of vegetables. The great blend of all my supposed crop failures is making it more savory and more nutritious every time….oh, I see. Now I see the big picture. I see all those people eating it too. They were hungry and tired. Now they’re full and rested. My vegetable garden really isn’t about me, is it?

Oh, Lord, you were just trying to get me to work along side you…and I was trying to get, well, what I wanted. 

Verklempt

Verklempt

My very limited Yiddish vocabulary I learned from my disciple and “darling Friend” Jett Segal. She’s a Messianic Jew, classy, smart and savvy. We roomed together back in the 80’s before Mr. Ten Days came roaring onto the scene of my life. It was through Jett that I learned this wonderful word, “verklempt”, meaning “moved by emotion”.

The Jewish people are infamous for their deep well of emotion…think “Fiddler on the Roof”. But I have to say that many other people groups are also known for the same kind of intensity. For instance if you are lucky enough to have Egyptian friends like I do, then you have witnessed some sweet, passionate emotional displays.

 Now if you know me at all you know that I bleed Red White and Blue. As a young girl one of my life’s ambitions (not that there were many beyond going to college and getting my MRS.) was to never leave the South. I was not the least bit interested in “foreigners” as my Daddy called anyone who hailed from north of the Mason-Dixon line. Our anthem was that country song that says “If Heaven ain’t like Dixie, I don’t want to go”. Although I am half French (which explains a lot) and half German by bloodlines, I am still sort of a fourth or fifth generation of generic American. I think that somewhere along the line many of us “generic Americans” lost our individual culture. Maybe we adopted too much of our Mother country, Great Britain (sorry Heather) where they are stoic, reserved and very private. All my Downton Abbey peeps can attest to this.

But, to skip a huge part of my life story, which believe me you do not have time to hear, I ended up in the last place I had ever thought I would be, all the way from Dixie to serving as a Campus Minister in places like Hawaii and California.  Campus Ministry in (very) short means ministering to any one who will listen to you regarding the Gospel. This was the beauty of being a Campus Minister, where the nations literally come to your doorstep. So, without knowing it, through a radical act of obedience, basicly God  set out to introduce me to His children. What a “surprise party” is was for me. One of the best surprises was my new found ability to recognize and embrace moments of verklempt-ness.

Today I was verklempt. Although I usually get this way on grey days, it happened right in the middle of a gorgeous sunny perfect pre-Spring top-down day. I walked into Starbucks, laid my eyes on the lovely lemon iced pound cake in the case and there I was. Longing for my friend Kim White who adores the lovely lemon pound cake.

It all got me to thinking… About being “reserved”, and “cool” and God forbid sounding “needy”. I remember the old days …ok, I realize most of you don’t remember any of this but maybe you’ve seen it in “period” movies. Back when people put their strong feelings down on paper. You do remember paper, right? They put pen to paper, dropped a tear on it and put it in the mail. And then they waited. Waited for their dear one to receive it, then for the reply. Postmen were quite popular back then.  And, gone are the days of the of the thrill of the very expensive so, consequently very short, long  distance phone calls. They didn’t “shoot” them an email, or a text, or an instagram… I love that we can all stay connected like that, really I truly do.  But I believe, because we have each other at our finger tips we have lost the need for and the ability to say unapologetically --I. MISS. YOU.-- With the heart-felt fervor of yesteryear. It just seems to this old girl that we’ve all become mighty “cool”. I don’t like it. I like the unashamed passion of my ethnic friends who are taught by their culture that  its ok to really  lay their feelings out there. Ok, there are  ‘generic’ Americans that can do this too, I’m talking in general terms of the majority of people  here…  I want boisterous, emoting people. …Maybe I should move to Italy.

OR NOT, since Italy is somewhat northeast of the Mason-Dixon line.

“Are You the Tooth Fairy”?

Being born an old soul, our daughter Coco was what my Daddy use to call a “Philadelphia Lawyer”  from the day she started talking. If you are privileged to know her, I think you would heartily agree. She was a quiet and easy baby. She didn’t “say” much but just kind of took in everything with these huge blue eyes. Frankly, I was a little concerned. If she had not had her Daddy’s eyes, I would’ve thought I’d gotten the wrong baby at the hospital. But she was unmistakably marked by her Daddy. So much so that the first Sunday I brought her to church someone looked down into the carrier and said, “Well it’s Gregg Tipton in a bonnet”!

Knowing that she was a genetic mixture of my personality and Gregg’s (something akin to fire and gas) I expected a pretty hyper (crying, colicky, whining, up-all-night) baby. But, there she sat, curious but cool as a cucumber.

Then one day she woke up and remembered who she was. It was the day she started talking. And it wasn’t a word here and there, Coco was communicating in full blown sentences. She was under two and sounded like a four year old.

And with all of that talking came the Philadelphia lawyer-type communicating, and negotiating. Immediately she had a plan for everything. She had my day planned out for me and sweetly asked a string of unending questions. And mind you, not questions like "where did the moon come from" or "do dogs smile", but questions concerning the family’s schedule. As I patiently answered them, thinking this was how she learned, (silly me) she was actually giving me (truly) great ideas on how to improve the plan for the day ahead.

So you get the picture that our little Coco was a bit ahead of her time. Not one to “read” a picture book quietly in the corner, and certainly never one to play with age-appropriate toys (“Momma can I slice this tomato?”) she was a bit of a handful.

So, don’t ask me why I thought I could ever pull off the whole tooth fairy deal. I am not one to belabor the idea of the Tooth Fairy or Santa Claus, but I thought it might be fun for the first tooth or two. I got Caroline and Coco a little tooth Fairy pillow with the itty bitty pocket for the little bitty tooth, and we set about waiting for the first fall.

Even though Caroline is slightly older than Coco of course Coco was the first to lose a tooth. Kissing her good-night I happily tucked the sweet little pillow in bed with her and once she was asleep, I placed a dollar in the itty bitty pocket of the pillow (mind you I had to convince Mr. Ten Days that we should not give her $5.00 for that tooth! I gently reminded him of how many teeth were in each of our daughters’ pretty little heads and that we could not afford to pay that much per tooth.) That night I placed Coco’s precious little tooth in my button box….I mean, it’s all I could think of, where did you keep yours?

A few weeks later, I sent Coco to my room to wait for me to come and “correct” her. That was our politically correct word for spanking. The phone rang, I answered and Coco spent some time sitting in my bed. Bored in a nano as usual, she began to look through the button box on my night stand and happened upon the tooth.

As I walked in she was turning the tooth over in her little fingers with the look on her face of a prosecutor examining ‘Exhibit A’. I sat down beside her, already feeling the tension mounting. I sensed I was ‘in trouble’. She slowly lifted those baby blues from “Exhibit A” and pinned me like a D.A. in cross-examination (I swear I expected her to say “where were you on the night of…”). She squinted her eyes and steely asked “How did you get this tooth”? I swallowed hard and said what any Mother on trial would’ve said: “The Tooth Fairy gave it to me. Yep, she came in here after she left your room and gave it to me, just like I asked her to.”  Not put off for a second, she raised up on her knees, took me squarely by the shoulders, looked into my eyes and said firmly, “Momma. Don’t lie.” I tried to look as innocent as possible under such intense interrogation.

Then came my hour of reckoning. “Momma. Are YOU the Tooth Fairy?”

Yes. Guilty as charged. Tooth Fairy. Cook. Santa Claus. Cleaning Lady. Booboo-Kisser.  Chauffer. Spanker. Consoler. Teacher. Counselor. Cheerleader. Prayer Warrior. Sibling Referee. Ambulance Driver. Biggest Fan.  And Momma. A Momma who misses those days.  

Confused Daffodils

Have you seen them? It’s mid-February and daffodils are popping up everywhere. Along the winding roadside, in neighbors’ yards, I can’t help but notice them, and sigh. How sad that we won’t have our usual fabulous month of daffodils. I know we won’t because one of our Tennessee favorites is pushing up through the soil a month too early.

You see, they’ve all been tricked by this unseasonably warm weather. 

They must be saying to each other:  “It’s so gloriously sunny and warm, it must be mid- to- late March! “ (Uh, yes, I do realize I just put quotes around something a bulb might say ) And so these sweet blossoms stretch up out of the ground, slowly opening their not-ready-yet blooms, and BAM! It’ll be winter again. And all that beauty will be lost just because the daffodils have been looking at what’s happening around them, and choosing to copy every other bloom. And the real season that they’ve been waiting for all year will come but then, of course, it will be cut very short. Sadly most of the daffodils probably won’t even be able to fully open up their happy little yellow faces. They rushed to bloom.   And now they’ve lost their proverbial moment in the sun.

I have to say I’ve been a “confused daffodil” before; more than once, to be perfectly honest, but who’s counting ?

 And it all came down to my patience.  When thinking about various seasons of my life, I find that patience certainly isn’t my greatest virtue.  I’ve rushed lots of thoughts, lots of words, lots of applications, interviews, resume’s, and most regrettably the seasons of God.

Like those foolhardy daffodils, I’d take to looking at my circumstances, feeling the tug of my impatience and the adrenaline rush of emotional immaturity, then I determined that I would decide what season I was in rather than holding still. Falling out of step with that still small voice, misreading the signs through the lens of the impatient and the immature, I’d take my life in my own hands. I’d just take the situation right back out of God’s hands, where I’d placed it so many times before. Well ya know, God’s seasons can be awfully slow in coming and to quote Lady Grantham of Downton Abbey, “there’s nothing more tiring than waiting”. 

And so,  like the daffodils that misread a few warm days in the dead of winter, I  misconstrued the least bit of encouragement and defied God’s plan.  I’d try to force what I knew in my heart was not my moment…and by trying to “bloom” too soon, I ruined the whole thing.The price I paid for popping up and out too soon sometimes was high. Other times, not so much. But each time I missed the proud-of-me smile of God. And that irreplaceable, indescribeable feeling that He and I had done something together.

 

But heck, I don’t want to be a little ole daffodil anyway. I want to be a gorgeous aromatic Lily. A “Stargazer”. They’re pale pink with darker pink stripes or dots in their throat. They smell so heavenly, I can’t walk into Whole Foods without stopping first to take one long glorious whiff of  them where they sit in the floral department outshining every other bloom. I was so intent on this little happy ritual, that one day I leaned in a little too enthusiastically, and fell into the lovely display….but that’s another story. These flowers are so gorgeous that they would make someone literally “fall for them”.  They  are laboriously tended while they grow in perfectly climate regulated greenhouses. They’re carefully cut so that they might adorn the table or delight the lady of the house. They know their place. They don’t decide when to pop out of the ground. They wait for the hand of the ardent, wise gardener. 

  And, Mr. Ten Days, if you’re reading this, a bouquet of them sure would make this former daffodil mighty happy.